15 More Areas In Subways To Be Closed

By CALVIN SIMS

Published: March 29, 1991

Saying it had learned from its mistake in leaving a high-crime subway passageway open until a woman was raped in it last week, the New York City Transit Authority said yesterday that it would close 15 more subway entrances and passageways that the transit police consider dangerous.

The closings will affect thousands of passengers who use the entrances and passageways on the A, D, R and No. 6 subway lines in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens and the Bronx, but will not close any stations or completely eliminate transfers between any lines.

Jared Lebow, the Transit Authority's director of public information, said that the agency had declared an emergency "out of concern for public safety" and planned to close the entrances and passageways within seven days, without holding a public hearing or obtaining the approval of its parent agency, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. It will hold a public hearing as soon as is practical, he said. Barred With Plywood and Fencing

The 15 entrances and passageways will be blocked off with plywood and fencing until the Transit Authority holds the hearings and receives official permission to close the areas permanently, Mr. Lebow said.

"We are taking this action because we want our riders to be safe when they use the subways," Mr. Lebow said. "It is a direct response to the sexual assault on the woman last week."

On March 20, a woman was raped behind a pile of construction debris inside a subway tunnel that runs beneath the Avenue of the Americas to connect the 34th and 42d Street stations.

In the last year, the passageway was the site of scores of crimes and the transit police asked the Transit Authority to close it. But bureaucratic delays in obtaining approval from the Metropolitan Transportation Authority prevented the closing until the Transit Authority declared an emer gency and shut it down the day after the rape. Mr. Lebow said that the Transit Authority had erred in waiting for formal approval to close the tunnel and that transit officials did not want to repeat that mistake.

Chief Michael O'Connor, who heads the transit police's field services bureau, said the entrances and passageways scheduled for closing are located in isolated parts of stations that have high crime rates and low usage. By closing these areas, Chief O'Connor said, the transit police could redeploy many officers to fight crime in other parts of the subways.

Beverly Dolinsky, director of the M.T.A.'s Permanent Citizens Advisory Council, an advocacy group representing subway and bus riders, applauded the closings, saying the move would help to dispel the perception that the subways are not safe. Increasing 'Feeling of Safety'

"Although it may be inconvenient for some people to walk the long way around," Ms. Dolinsky said, "I think most riders won't mind because of the increased feeling of safety."

Councilwoman Carol Greitzer of Manhattan, who has long complained about safety in the subways, said the Transit Authority needs to do more than just close a few passageways.

"There are a lot of other dangerous nooks and crannies in the subways that need to be cardoned off, and signs need to be posted warning people of the danger," she said. "I was once trapped in a station exit and trust me it was a terrible, terrible feeling of being vulnerable that I will never forget."

Several parts of stations will be closed: some passageways at local stations between uptown and downtown sides of lines, little-used stairways to the street, entrances where token booths will be closed, and some "high wheel exits" -- revolving gates with interlaced steel bars that let passengers out. It will still be possible to transfer between uptown and downtown lines at stations where express trains stop. Call for Better Lighting

Ms. Greitzer and Ms. Dolinsky said that the Transit Authority should thoroughly inspect all subway stations and tunnels to identify other areas that are potentially unsafe and that the agency should install better lighting.

Many of the closings are in stations where many felonies had already been committed, but were not necessarily sites of high crime rates because so many people pass through them each day, including Grand Central, the 14th Street, Nostrand Avenue and Canal Street stations on the A line, the DeKalb Avenue station on the R line and Fordham Road station on the D line.

While the number of reported felonies in the subways rose 8.4 percent in 1990, felony crimes dropped sharply in the last three months of the year, compared with the same period of 1989. For January of this year, subway crime declined more than 20 percent. The transit police say the number dropped because of a crackdown on fare evasion that prevented people who would commit more serious crimes from entering the subway.

Chart shows area subway stations to be closed in Manhattan, Bronx, Brooklyn and Queens.